John Ford, Gary Cooper and TuPac:
Gangsta Rap and the Wild Wild West

created by Keonna Carter, June 2002

Who knows but that, on the
lower frequencies, I speak for you?
-Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

In September 1985, the Parents' Music Resource Center (PMRC) led by Tipper
Gore (wife of then Senator Al Gore of Tennessee) and Susan Baker (wife of
then Treasury Secretary James Baker) testified before the U.S. Senate Committee
on Commerce, Science and Transportation about the current state of music
lyrics. The PMRC and its expert witnesses testified that such music filled
youthful ears with pornography and violence, and glorified behaviors ranging
from murder and drug use to anti-patriotic activities. According to PMRC,
this music did not seem to reflect the core values of America and thus,
was somehow un-American.

On the contrary, nothing seems to be more "American" than the idea of the
West, the treasured national heirloom, passed down from one generation to
the next by way of Westerns, particularly movies. America loves the myth
of the West because it represents qualities that are thought to be uniquely
American: bravery, individualism, self-reliance and an instinctive commitment
to democracy. But in Westerns, how are the aforementioned qualities achieved?
The answer is quite simple; it is achieved through violence, murder, drug
use (liquor being the drug of choice) and pornography, just like the highly
criticized lyrics of rap music.

Rap music, particularly West-coast gangsta rap (primarily confined to the
state of California) is the medium by which present-day Black youth are
transporting the ideas of the West for yet another generation. But what
disguises the world of the West found in the lyrics from rap's loudest critics
is not variant themes and behavior, but having it delivered from an angry
black youth on a microphone, instead of middle-aged white man on a movie
screen. So while others like the PMRC would have America believe that the
lyrics of rap are aberrant, this site will illustrate how rap music contains
the same underlying themes of "the West" and is just as American as apple
pie.